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20-21/100 days of productivity

During the weekend i was ill, but now i am so back! I started studying for the exam i’ll have on the 24th of march, which is chemistry. I think i’ll do well enough if i stay consistent now (:

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Preparing for my French Oral exam today! The printers at the uni library are being incredibly annoying, so I have to wait ages for a printout to highlight, but I am planning my commentary in the meantime :)

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04.03.2025

Notes about different types of synapses. I also baked Icelandic cream buns for the first time, which turned out pretty well!

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4 March 2025

The first chemical technology lab was super fun! I'm surprised I enjoyed it as much as I did, given it's kind of... ochem-heavy and I absolutely detested ochem labs. But I had a good time! Fingers crossed that won't change.

Lab partner and I made biofuel via esterification and transesterification reactions. The former was a reaction between oleic acid and methanol in acidic solution. The resulting ester - methyl oleate - has a greater density than methanol which is why it falls to the bottom of the cylinder, as you can see in the gif. It was so cool to see these "bubbles" in the entire volume just floating downwards as the reaction progressed. I love chemistry! 💖

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guys i’m being so productive this semester, this is new for me

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[3/3/25] my friend came to visit over the weekend (all the way from fucking London), so i had a blast taking her around my college! i also got my calculations working, and i found a new observable to gnaw on.

i had a very necessary conversation with my research mentor last week, and i think im a lot more at peace with where i am right now.

senior spring still chugs on. we must make the most of the days we have.

song: Just For You by iKON

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New character unlocked? Geospatial engineer ⚙️

Worked on the PG project, it was kinda fun? Got to talk more to my classmates, and joke around so yay. Then I walked around, browsed some shops, bought a book (oops), some thread for embroidery and a mug in a thrift store. Chatted with the old lady at the store, so I'm feeling proud of my social skills today.

Also had a coffee date with an old friend turned stranger turned maybe hopeful acquaintance turned stranger again? Idk, it was nice seeing her again, but I think we outgrew the friendship, it's time to let go completely ಥ⁠‿⁠ಥ

So yeah, busy day, didn't study at all, and I need to work on the pti project tomorrow!!!

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So I've just seen this post with "pictures" of molecules and I said in the tags if people really knew how tiny atoms and molecules are, they'd find it as staggering as the equally absurd numbers that characterize the distances in the outer space. And ya know what? Let's go there, let's do that!

This will be loosely based on a numerical that they made us do in my very first fundamentals of chemistry seminar to help us baby first years get a feel for how gigantic the Avogadro's number is.

Take a 250 ml glass and fill it up with water to the brim. Water density depends on the temperature, but it's conveniently very close to 1 g/cm^3, so that gives us 250 g of water in our glass which in turn gives us (250 g) / (18 g/mol) = 14 moles of water in the glass. If you're wondering what the hell a mole is, then let's just say it's something that helps us go from the mass of something to the number of molecules that something contains.

Speaking of which, we get 14 mol × [6 × 10^(23) molecules/mol] = 8 × 10^(24) molecules of water in our glass - a number so absurdly big it's impossible to truly comprehend it. So let's try to help our brains see it.

usmint says that the US cent is 1.52 mm thick. Let's imagine we have 8 × 10^(24) cents - the number of water molecules in a glass - and we build a tower with them by placing one coin on top of the other (assuming this tower can actually hold up!). Our tower will end up being 1.52 mm × 8 × 10^(24) = 10^(25) mm = 10^(19) km tall. Ten to the power of nineteen! That's 10000000000000000000 kilometers! If this snake of a number isn't bonkers enough by itself, then let me tell you that our tower is not only longer than the diameter of the Solar System, it is longer than the diameter of the Milky Way.

But wait, there's more!

Given that the speed of light is 3 × 10^5 km/s, light would need [10^(19) km] / [3 × 10^5 km/s] = 3 × 10^(13) seconds to travel from the base of the tower to its top. Assuming there are approximately 31 million seconds in a year, that's [3 × 10^(13)] / [31 × 10^(6)] = 10^6 years. One million years!!

This is how absurdly tiny molecules are.

Yeah, I'm using some pretty rough approximations in this post, but with how unimaginably gigantic the end result is, I think it's rather safe to do that. Also, obviously, a molecule isn't the same as an atom. Molecules can be "big" - proteins, anyone? - but the water molecule is relatively small in comparison + it's such a common substance that we interact with everyday, so I wanted to use it.

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Monday March 3, 2025

this week might be the end of me i think. took friday off as a rest day because I havent done anything that isnt working or sleeping since reading week ended and also i needed it after possibly failing my calc midterm 😭 its fineee only 2 more to go,,,,

This week:

Modern Phys - 8/10

Astro - 20/20 ✅

EM - 8/14

study for math quiz ✅

Astro star assignment

Modern Phys Midterm (god help me)

Astro Midterm

EM post lab ✅

Astro lab report (half done)

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Me: [talks about how I found this website where you can see all the Bravais lattices from different angles and how it's been helping me with crystallochemistry]

My thesis supervisor, genuinely meaning to be helpful as always: the lattices really aren't something to worry about, there are much worse things in crystallography :)

Me:

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03.03.25 || breathe in

The scholarship documents I filled out yesterday turned out to be pretty useless as my scholarship then uploaded a completely different document for me to fill out. Oh well.

To Do:

message about flat

go through old lecture notes on International Law

lunch

make flash cards

write to a friend who already took the exam

work on first 50 pages

All the best AJ

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Hii, 20 and 32 for the study ask game <3

Hey, thanks for asking! 💙💙

20. What was your worst experience with a professor and/or school administration?

Ooo this will be A RANT.

Luckily both the administration and most of the professors at my faculty are at least all right, but I still seethe thinking about my pchem seminar prof (genuinely I can't even stand to see him around the building lol). As is often the case with pchem - which is universally considered a very difficult subject - there were these three people in my group who understood pchem very well and then the rest of us were just like "😳 HELP".

The prof however was absolutely certain we were just lazy and not trying hard enough. He kept calling on those three people to solve all the exercises and ignored literally the whole group who had no idea what the hell was going on. He'd never answer our questions. I still remember the one time I asked him something and his answer was, "because that's the way it is" 💀 He wouldn't answer emails either because then "everyone would start emailing him" 💀💀💀

I taught myself the entire material without any help and when the first test came around, I got one of the best scores in the group. The professor then decided I was "secretly good at pchem and just hiding it in class for some reason" (literally his words) and he'd keep bringing it up (and not nicely) for the rest of the semester.

So yeah, awful experience, thanks for giving me an opportunity to rant about it 😂

32. What's the easiest part of studying for you?

Answered here!

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AHHH thank you I'm doing my best :') Also, what a sweet story omg your professor sounds really really kind! (And she's totally right)

Hi!! 3 and 12 please? :)

Hi Lena, how's your semester going? (Looking forward to seeing you ace crystallochemistry!)

3. What's something a professor said that has stuck with you since?

Sooo my last year of the translation degree I was feeling lost, demotivated and apathetic. I had to retake the final for a German translation seminar, and I got to talking to my Professor about everything I was feeling afterwards. We got interrupted, I left, and a few months later I got a letter in the mail. She was sweet and thoughtful, and what stuck with me was her saying I should follow the path I felt would give me a higher purpose in life, would give me the most joy personally, and not necessarily professionally. I don't know, I just felt seen by her, and I think about her all the time. That was almost two years ago, and I haven't replied (I've started and drafted a few emails), something I need to remedy fast. But yeah, I still read her letter :)

12. What's your favourite part of the study process?

I think it's when I finally become confident in the material, be it understanding a concept or thinking of a solution for a project, etc. Just feeling the studying has payed off, and that I've discovered/can work with something new!

Thanks for the asks! <3 (I'll drop some off on your inbox as well haha)

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Been staring at the same word docs all weekend…but at least when I take a break I get a pretty view ⚓️

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✨Few hours difference ✨

I start rotations tomorrow! I am terrified! And so excited !

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So I've just seen this post with "pictures" of molecules and I said in the tags if people really knew how tiny atoms and molecules are, they'd find it as staggering as the equally absurd numbers that characterize the distances in the outer space. And ya know what? Let's go there, let's do that!

This will be loosely based on a numerical that they made us do in my very first fundamentals of chemistry seminar to help us baby first years get a feel for how gigantic the Avogadro's number is.

Take a 250 ml glass and fill it up with water to the brim. Water density depends on the temperature, but it's conveniently very close to 1 g/cm^3, so that gives us 250 g of water in our glass which in turn gives us (250 g) / (18 g/mol) = 14 moles of water in the glass. If you're wondering what the hell a mole is, then let's just say it's something that helps us go from the mass of something to the number of molecules that something contains.

Speaking of which, we get 14 mol × [6 × 10^(23) molecules/mol] = 8 × 10^(24) molecules of water in our glass - a number so absurdly big it's impossible to truly comprehend it. So let's try to help our brains see it.

usmint says that the US cent is 1.52 mm thick. Let's imagine we have 8 × 10^(24) cents - the number of water molecules in a glass - and we build a tower with them by placing one coin on top of the other (assuming this tower can actually hold up!). Our tower will end up being 1.52 mm × 8 × 10^(24) = 10^(25) mm = 10^(19) km tall. Ten to the power of nineteen! That's 10000000000000000000 kilometers! If this snake of a number isn't bonkers enough by itself, then let me tell you that our tower is not only longer than the diameter of the Solar System, it is longer than the diameter of the Milky Way.

But wait, there's more!

Given that the speed of light is 3 × 10^5 km/s, light would need [10^(19) km] / [3 × 10^5 km/s] = 3 × 10^(13) seconds to travel from the base of the tower to its top. Assuming there are approximately 31 million seconds in a year, that's [3 × 10^(13)] / [31 × 10^(6)] = 10^6 years. One million years!!

This is how absurdly tiny molecules are.

Yeah, I'm using some pretty rough approximations in this post, but with how unimaginably gigantic the end result is, I think it's rather safe to do that. Also, obviously, a molecule isn't the same as an atom. Molecules can be "big" - proteins, anyone? - but the water molecule is relatively small in comparison + it's such a common substance that we interact with everyday, so I wanted to use it.

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Actual pictures of molecules taken by IBM. 

This is the model of what pentacene looks like, and this is what it looked like in reality. 

This excites me.